Not Anymore
by andthecosmogirl
Summary: He's not worth it, not anymore. One-shot, higher rating for language, to be safe.


Jake Martin stepped into the cramped house he once shared with his step-mother, father and step-sister, Clare Edwards. Although things are head and shoulders better than they had been between them since he moved out, started working, eventually caving to school at a community college he will always have a place in his heart for her. He took his girlfriend, Katie Matlin along for the visit. He heard the disturbing news that his smoking buddy and former best friend dared to break his sister's heart. Sans all romantic histories, he had a high respect for his smart and studious step sister and like a knight in shining armor would defend her honor if he had to.

Clare was silent in the living room in front of the television with a box of half-eaten chocolates, beside her. Still in her pajamas. She had a few finished pints of ice cream sitting on the coffee table, in her hands there was another most likely. Her back was to them. She looked as if she hadn't really left the couch in quite some time. On the television she was watching T_he Notebook_, typical. She hadn't heard them come in, engrossed in the film. She was in her robe, her blonde wig glistened.

Jake gingerly closed the front door in an effort not to disturb her. Helen, he had called earlier and she wasn't going to home for some time running errands with his father. It was just going to be them three.

Jake and Katie exchanged some expression and quickly they both joined her on the smaller love seat by the large couch that Clare had managed to take up with her blankets. They finally got a good look at her, she smiled though, relieved to see Jake and Katie, she managed a quiet hello but her voice had been raw from crying over the past few days. Fortunately she didn't have to deal with school for the next week because thanksgiving was right around the corner and they had a few days off.

"I know what happened Clare and I-_we_ want you to know that we're here for you, whatever you need." Jake said seated hunched over, looking at her compassionately. Katie offered a slightly uncomfortable smile, but agreed as well. Jake and Katie had been doing well since they managed to rekindle their romance after she had cheated on him. Clare's cross to bear wasn't that she wanted to break up with Eli, that was already done it was the after effect, the loneliness that lately has been filled with chick flicks and ice cream. Jake was the only person she really talked to besides Alli who had just about had enough of the Eli talk. Besides, Clare not wanting to appear needy urged her to spend more time with Leo, now that they have some time off and she has time to spend. She didn't want Alli to be morose and melancholy on a count of her. The usually feisty and bookish she was sort of vigilante and was speaking high gestures of revenge but Clare didn't want that yet. She wasn't really in the mood. She didn't talk to her mom about it, out of a discomfort but Helen knew better and called Jake to tell her the news. Jake knew though that something had gone wrong when just before Clare deleted her Facerange, she changed her romantic status to single.

It was tense, Jake abandoned the initial idea which was to give Eli a piece of his mind on Facerange but later decided he didn't want to air that publicly. Truthfully, he wanted to beat him mercilessly for hurting her. Jake knew that he himself had hurt her in the past. Fighting fire with fire wasn't going to help the uphill battle of the temper.

Katie pursed her lips uncomfortably, she knew the story. It was her who had convinced Jake not to go through with the Facerange beat down, because it was something that he couldn't take back. He didn't know the story but it didn't really matter there was no changing his mind Eli was wrong. For his sister's sake he wanted to handle things diligently and sensitively. Katie offered, "How are you?"

Clare spoke eerily quietly it was just so not like her, tears forming in her eyes, it looked as if it was the first time she had put things in this particular perspective, "Three years, off and on and he said it was because he _missed_ me."

Katie made a face, thoroughly disgusted, "That's a crock of shit and you know it, Clare."

Jake masked his face in his hands shaking his head, his anger sort of boiling up again, muffled he said, "Fucking coward."

Clare exclaimed defiantly as she whipped her head around to eye Jake shaking his head, "At least he told me!"

"How did it even come up?" Katie asked carefully, she sort of intimating him his demeanor. "_Oh by the way babe . . . _ "

The heartbroken girl responded, straight faced, courageously. "I caught him with cigarettes. Take a wild guess who they belonged to."

The pair shrugged their shoulders, "Who?"

"The girl he cheated with, his _fucking editor_." Jake sighed, "How could I be so trusting? So stupid." She looked down beginning to cry again. Clare's crestfallen tears were enough to send Jake over the edge. With that, he stood up, causing the girls to jump with the suddenly urgency of his footsteps.

He was serious, ravenous with anger in his eyes as he exclaimed, "That's it!" He looked to Clare, "Don't you dare beat up on yourself because of what _he_ did, Clare. It's what he wants. "Come on, Katie!" She hesitated looking the Clare with pleading eyes to make him stop, he continued pulled harder, "I'm going to find him and sucker punch him and show him what fucking over my sister looks like!"

Katie recoiled attempting to let go of his strong hold on her she pulled him back to her on the couch as he tried unsuccessfully for the door. Clare stood up in her pajama pants sobbing no over and over again, "Please Jake no!"

Clare's pleas forced him to stop as soon as he started and reevaluate his brash idea, he just was so hurt, so angry and so let down from someone he once considered a friend. Clare was an inherently good girl. She saved herself for Eli but she almost gave all that up to him and for Eli to cheat and screw her over was enough to make Eli look sane. Jake punched the couch with the force that could quite possibly kill Eli, if only as he helplessly fell back onto the couch followed by a silence by all three of them.

"He's not worth it," Finally, Clare managed to escape one thing to Jake as he shook his head still flabbergasted by his temper getting to him, his step-sister's broken heart and everything else circulating the room in the minutes since he walked in. "Not _anymore_."


End file.
